Our Vineyards

Planted in 1880 beneath the Brokenback Range, Old Hill is one of the oldest continuously worked vineyards in Australia. The site drew Maurice O’Shea’s attention for its volcanic soils threaded with granite, its natural afternoon shade, and its striking resemblance to the hillside vineyards of the Southern Rhône. It was this convergence of geology and microclimate that first convinced O’Shea that the Hunter Valley could produce reds of genuine distinction. It became the foundation of his vision for Mount Pleasant and remains the estate’s most historic block and among Australia’s most important vineyards.

Established in 1921 using cuttings drawn from Old Hill, Old Paddock was the first vineyard Maurice O’Shea planted at Mount Pleasant. The two sites share an origin and stand 500 metres apart on the same volcanic soil, yet they produce wines of markedly different character. It is the deep red volcanic loams here that set Old Paddock apart, drawing out a natural concentration and firm tannin architecture that has come to define its own powerful, age-worthy wine style. Over a century of distinguished vintages, it has established a clear and separate identity as one of Australia’s great red wine sites.

The Mothervine vineyard sits within the historic Old Hill site and is home to the oldest deliberately planted pinot noir vines in Australia. Planted by Maurice O’Shea in 1921, the original MV6 vines established here became the source material for most pinot noir plantings across the country, making Mothervine a genuine point of origin for the variety on Australian soil. Grown on Old Hill’s red volcanic soils, the wines carry more than a century of provenance, vibrant and precise, with earthy depth, fine chalky tannins and a natural balance that speaks directly to the age and character of the vines. There is no other vineyard quite like it.

Planted by Maurice O’Shea in 1946, with later plantings in 1965, Rosehill’s lower northern aspect is one of the defining features of the vineyard. Its ancient volcanic soils and considered vine orientation give the shiraz here a composure and precision all of its own. O’Shea recognised from the outset that Rosehill had the potential to produce something exceptional, and the vineyard has spent the decades since making good on that promise. These are wines that reward patience, revealing their full complexity with time in the cellar.

Planted in 1946 and first produced as a wine in 1950, Lovedale set the benchmark for Hunter Valley semillon and has largely maintained it ever since. The vineyard’s sandy aggregate loam topsoil and low fertility subsoils produce fruit of exceptional restraint and precision, yielding wines that arrive tightly wound before opening slowly into something of remarkable depth and elegance. In the words of critic Campbell Mattinson, Lovedale is “the land we drink when we want to drink the best.” Its reputation is both hard won and long held. Lovedale is widely regarded as the defining expression of single vineyard semillon, not only in the Hunter Valley, but anywhere in the world.